Something Remains
by fiesa
Summary: It still feels like she is there. Mara is never far from her husband and son. OneShot.


**Something Remains **

_Summary: It still feels like she is there. Mara is never far from her husband and son. OneShot. _

_Warning: spoilers for the Fate of the Jedi Series, Abyss._

_Set: Luke and Ben finally leave the Maw._

_Disclaimer: Standards apply. _

_

* * *

_

The _Jade Shadow_ was more than a ship.

Ben felt it in his entire being, every time he entered the ship or left it. It wasn't a Force manifestation. It wasn't a wish born from the need to be close to his mother once again. It was something far deeper, far more unconscious, far more than he ever would be able to understand.

He knew his father felt the same.

He knew because he saw the sadness in his father's ice-blue eyes and the weariness in his movements. He saw the way creases had buried themselves into his face and how his hands had become wrinkled. He looked old and exhausted and even though great parts of his exhaustion were due to several weeks he had spent with the Mind Walkers, Ben knew part of it wasn't.

He felt it in his father's Force presence.

Maybe taking the _Shadow _hadn't been such a great idea after all.

Luke Skywalker was checking the pre-flight list a last time while his son watched him from the corners of his eyes. The Grand Master in exile had a frown of concentration on his features. _Has he always looked like that_, Ben wondered. He didn't look like the sixty and five years he nearly was. He didn't look like he had survived several wars, lost friends, the love of his life, a hand, his family. This man didn't look like he was the Grand Master of an order as powerful as the Jedi, the head of a group of people that scattered throughout the galaxy and kept peace and balance.

Well, that _had_ scattered throughout the galaxy.

It wasn't safe for Jedi anymore and this was a man banished from Coruscant.

Luke Skywalker, simply put, didn't look like any important person but like a sad, exhausted, physically weak and yet determined, strong but aged, man. He looked like Ben's father.

"Are you finished staring at me?"

A muffled voice broke his thoughts and Ben yanked himself back into reality. The sound of his father's voice carried amusement.

Trying to feign nonchalance and yet knowing his father _knew_ what he felt and probably what he had thought, too, Ben shrugged.

"You're taking your time."

"Don't worry, I'll hand her over soon. You'll be able to get away from this place as fast as you think you can make her fly."

"That'll be fast, believe me."

Luke grinned at the unveiled cynics in his son's voice. "Come on. The Maw isn't that bad."

"It is not?" Ben shot back.

"So don't tell me you liked the way we discovered a station between two black holes in which crazies calling themselves Mind Walkers tried to trick us into getting lost in the shadows and where a strike force of Sith tried to kill us?"

"It was a rather interesting month, wasn't it."

"That's _certainly_ a way to put it."

"Watch it, son. You're developing a Jedi Master sense of humor."

Ben laughed and watched as his father pulled himself up from the pilot's chair. He still was so thin and worn he looked like a living corpse, even now, after having spent an entire day in a Jedi Healing Trance. Anger, hurt and hate bubbled up inside him as he remembered the Mind Walkers had tried to starve his father. He exhaled slowly, letting all the negative emotions flow from him and holding onto the huge relief that his father was alive.

"I'm getting some rest again. You'll take her out carefully, will you?"

"_Dad._ _Sixteen_. _Pilot._ Stop treating me like a child."

Luke chuckled.

"Just checking on you. If you get a single scratch on her, your mother will kill you."

With that, he disappeared into the interior of the _Jade's Shadow._

Ben stared after him, frozen in shock but quickly concealing his surprise in the Force as to not alert his father to it. What in the name of the Force had _that_ been? They had met his mother, Mara Jade Skywalker, in the Pond of Remembrance in the Shadow World, the world in which the Mind Walkers had tried to trap them. But somehow, it had sounded as if his father had meant it, as if he believed Mara Jade Skywalker was still _alive_. Had he lost it? Had those weeks he had spent with the Mind Walkers stolen his rationality, had he gone crazy as had so many other Jedi Knights during the last weeks?

From his father's force presence, there was no indication as to whether Luke had noticed his son's distress or not. There was only pure, simple exhaustion and solemn calm, peace even. Ben leaned back and considered whether he should follow his father to check on him. But nothing in the Force told him there was something wrong. He decided to send Aunt Leia a holonet message. Maybe she would know what was wrong with Dad.

Ben recorded a short summary on their adventures, making sure not to reveal anything in case the message went astray and checking the encryption three times before sending. Then he strapped into the pilot's seat, reached out with the Force to make sure his father was sleeping deeply, and reached for the levers that would take them away from here.

And then, he felt it.

_He's right, you know. One scratch and you're not going to like the consequences, Ben._

_Mom?_

No words.

Silent laughter, a bright smile. A warm hand, the soft rustling of golden hair, a soft kiss on his head. A hand on his hand. A familiar scent.

Ben stayed frozen to the spot for a few minutes even after the closeness of his mother's touch had dissipated. But it wasn't entirely gone, he knew. She was there, _here,_ in the _Shadow_. She was with them. She would always be, and that was all that mattered. Ben forced down the lump in his throat and took the _Shadow_ out of the ancient hangar of Centerpoint's little brother.

In his trance, in the sleeping quarters of the _Jade's Shadow,_ Luke Skywalker smiled.


End file.
